Adobe Photoshop Touch App For Android

This is the finished photo from one of the built-in tutorials, of which one step is shown as a grab below. Making selections is quick and easy with the new Scribble Selection tool but using the Refine Edge tool to tidy up requires some practice with a fingertip

Following Adobe’s capable but somewhat underpowered Photoshop Express app, Photoshop Touch provides some insights into Adobe's vision of the future of image manipulation on tablets. For the time being Photoshop Touch is available for Android only, and only powerful Honeycomb models at that, but there are plans afoot for an iOS version compatible with Apple's iPad. At $9.99, Photoshop Touch is one of the more expensive apps in the Market but for that price it offers some interesting and unique capabilities.

One of Photoshop Touch's most interesting features is the Scribble Selection tool, which allows you to make selections by dragging your finger, as you would a mouse in the full-strength desktop version of Photoshop. Scribble Selection is very versatile but complex backgrounds can trip it up.

Unsurprisingly, Photoshop Touch doesn't offer the same level of flexibility as the full desktop version, but its feature set is impressively 'deep' nonetheless, and includes support for layers, a decent array of familiar Photoshop selection tools, effects and filters. Also available is a range of image acquisition options including synching to Adobe’s Creative Cloud, Facebook and Google Images.

When images are opened they are converted in the app to a psdx layer format. When exported to Facebook, saved to the tablet, or emailed they're converted to the JPEG file format, at a maximum output resolution of 1600 pixels (along the longest edge). When exported to Adobe's Creative Cloud, the file remains a psdx file and can be opened in Photoshop CS5 using a free plugin, and then saved in any format (although the 1600 pixel limit still applies).

The 1600 pixel limit is disappointing, but at least - unlike the earlier Photoshop Express app - zooming to 100% is possible, and very easy using the now-standard 'pinch apart' gesture. With a restricted workspace Adobe has done well to keep the UI as streamlined as possible - a familiar tool palette arranged vertically down the left-hand side can be minimized to make best use of the screen’s real estate while a menu bar along the top features more tools and drop-down windows for adjustments and effects.

An uncluttered UI makes good use of your tablet's screen real estate - panels on the left and on the right can be minimized. Keep in mind though that this image shows Photoshop Touch running on a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 which boasts a generous (10.1-inch) screen.

Applying adjustments is easy - you simply select the effect from a series of thumbnails and then drag your finger horizontally on the slider to increase or decrease the strength. Painting or making selections is more tricky, however, if only because your fingertip obscures the view. The new Scribble Selection tool helps overcome this to a point, although complex backgrounds can be problematic.

We would still recommend a stylus (such as the Bamboo from Wacom) but there’s a handy offset pointer option that works well, but it’s odd that you must have a second finger touching the screen to activate it – lift either finger off for a second and the process is interrupted. At times though, some of the actions such as zooming, processing and others, can feel a bit laggy on my Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. In spite of its limitations, Photoshop Touch feels accomplished and its mix of power, flexibility and ease of use is impressive.

What we like: Easy selections using a fingertip, support for layers and many familiar Photoshop functions

Comments

I wouldn't consider this or any other Android app a replacement for PC software, at least as things stand today. My thought is that this is a way to do some basic things, "quick and dirty" in the field (or on vacation).

Today I use a Netbook for this...and there probably needs to be better RAW support with Android before I really consider leaving the Netbook or laptop at home, and going anywhere with just tablet + camera.

What this article does not reveal is that android has a 25MB limit to any image adjustment program.Meaning that whatever number of versions are reuired to get from your original image to your final touched-up image, all these vesions can not exceede a total of 25MB.

This is an Android Limitation.

There is a very good solution to this problem and it is the app 'Photo Enhance Pro'. It gets around the 25MB limitation by working each image one line of pixels at a time.It is ingenious and works very, very well. I use it for my photo journalism on a daily basis.

Be aware that once you mke adjustments the displayed, unsaved result is a bit soft. But when you save the image and view it with 'Quick Pic' you will be amazed at how good the clarity, sharpness, color of Photo Enhance Pro works.

I have takef time to to test it on some work I do. the image was 1200*800. I was using two layers. and after two hours I just erse the project. in desktop photoshop it takes 10min to do the job.whta was the bigest problems I have :in first it was wery bad performance.in second wery strange work with layers in third , theagic selection is useless and manual selection is preaty hard by fingerand at last I was wery disapointed about the brush and look of the brush, it was always to hard at the edges so it was unable to do soft transitions

i can not send you the picture (company isues)but basicali it was a photo from inside of helicopter. and the main think it was replacement of the vysual of the terrain with another one and then color and light corrections.

No, it proves that tablets using mobile OSes are nowhere near laptops/desktop editing. An x86 tablet running Windows and full PS can easily be better than desktop/laptop simply because it comes with a Wacom digitiser. Take a look at the Samsung Series 7 Slate and the Asus EP121. We'll see more and better examples as W8 and 22nm processors start rolling out.

1) its hard to develop for android, because you cant be sure what tablet/OS version the user uses

2)that adobe doesnt care about tablet users, beccause they sell their normal software for around 100x of what they charge for their mobile softwar

3)that adobe thinks its enough to just be adobe and call their product photoshop to attract buyers

4)that often there are way better apps from small developers than from a major studios

5)sorry for that, but that apple rules the tablet market, i mean ok ps is not out for iOS so far, but we all know, if apple says it runs fluently on an iOS device, it just does ^^

6) and last but not least, i use a d700 and a d3, and i can connect my camera to my ipad2, download the RAWs, edit them with filterstorm and upload them from anywhere on the go, and since i have an ipad i dont take my laptop with me, and customers get their pictures available online before they are at home. sometimes before they leave the location^^

@ 2) The truth of it is that Adobe is losing money on this, much the same with a lot of the photo editing software available on iOS. This is largely due to market saturation and the supply and demand on mobile applications. These apps are meant to support those who use their vastly more expensive PC programs. If they sold Photoshop Touch at the price it would take to make money, nobody would buy it.

Even if tablet hardware was powerful enough to leverage apps as powerful as Adobe Lightroom, Apple Aperture, or Photoshop, until market saturation is some how contained, devs like Adobe, Nik, or Apple will not cannibalize their PC market.

Since when is 1600 x 1600 "real high resolution"? I have never owned a digital camera with resolution that low! Maybe a camera-phone years ago; I no longer remember.

I did try to use it with a Toshiba Thrive but I was not able to pan after zooming the image. There are no tutorials or instructions on *using* the app, only on how to make various edits, and nothing on how to view or inspect the picture to decide what, if anything, to do.

Everything is driven by unlabeled icons. You won't get anywhere unless you're already proficient with Photoshop/desktop.

All this technology is made for serous AMATEURS.If I am going to rely on the thickness of my FINGER to pick a PIXEL. Makers of this are smoking some serous hallucinogens substance...not to mention SIZE of the screen no matter how much you can zoom in.I am pretty skeptical about miniaturization of something that need to be big.Also processor power is something that is NOT POWERFUL enough to manage 20 megapixel RAW image...which is again not available in these smart devices.